It was the composer himself who first spoke of
his work as derivative of Mahler’s Song of the Earth,
and the comparison with Schoenberg’s Gurre-lieder was
obvious enough for others to make. Rabindranath Tagore,
on tour in Europe after having won the Nobel Prize for
Literature in 1913, recited his poetry in Prague in Bengali
in 1921 (We are indebted to the preface to the Universal
Edition pocket score by Anthony Beaumont for this information.).
Janáček and Zemlinsky were in the audience and were
profoundly moved by this performance in a language they
did not understand. They may have read the author’s published
English translations or Hans Effenberger’s subsequent German
translations. Zemlinsky selected numbers 5, 7, 30, 29,
48, 51 and 61 from Tagore’s anthology The Gardener outlining
the progress of a love affair from initial hopefulness
to final despair. There exists the possibility of an English
language performance - or a Bengali performance - although
I’ve never heard of one.

The Fischer-Dieskau recording is set at an incredibly
high energy throughout, more like a “Thunderstorm Symphony”.
Although the score marks the opening orchestral tutti fortissimo,
the baritone’s entrance is marked piano. However
Fischer-Dieskau comes on yelling his head off; the words
in the text say, “I am restless,” not, “I am hysterical!” but
Maazel and his soloists present a furious whirlwind of
passionate emotion which does not relent. It’s an experience
not to be missed, but in the final analysis probably not
a valid rendering of the work, which is probably why that
recording has been unavailable for some years now. Terfel,
Voight, and Sinopoli present a more balanced and measured
version, the soloists still sounding very “operatic”. Voight’s
voice has a mezzo quality to it, a slight thickness. Terfel’s
is rich and thrilling and — like Fischer-Dieskau — is magisterial
even when the poetry is more personal and reflective in
meaning and mood. The orchestral sound has a slightly shrill
opacity to it as though some unfortunate microphoning has
been salvaged by a little audio post-processing.

This new recording attains a thoughtful, at times
reflective, mood with the orchestral accompaniment played
with great precision and sensitivity, at a controlled volume
which allows the soloists to sing quietly when appropriate.
The soloists place the meaning of the text before all else,
and the conductor shapes the orchestral accompaniment so
as not to overpower the gentler phrases. This recording
more than the others resembles the Mahler work; clearly
what Zemlinsky had in mind, a “Lyrical Symphony,” achieving
a deeply expressive mood.

Christine Schäfer having distinguished herself
in stage performances of Berg’s Lulu and recordings
of, among other composers, J. S. Bach, here amply confirms
her eminent position as one of the finest artists before
us today. She has the perfect Mahler voice, light and transparent,
yet capable of deep expression and tremendous power. Matthias
Goerne has the beauty, control, and immediacy of the young
Fischer-Dieskau and he brings tremendous feeling to his
interpretation. The orchestra plays precisely and responsively
producing a rich multi-tonal texture to underlie the voices,
never to overpower them. There is no sense of struggle
or competition. The surround sound perspective places the
soloists just in front of the center of the orchestra and
the richness of orchestral detail is brilliantly revealed
by the high resolution SACD sound.

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